Just Maybe
by bluemacaroons
Summary: AU. He was a hockey player and she was a figure skater, he never knew how much they would really have in common. Rated T mostly for cussing probably, hints of other ships
1. Encounter

**First Gruvia fic, enjoy!**

Chapter 1: Encounter

There was a handful of things Gray Fullbuster thoroughly enjoyed, and serving arrogant 12 year olds greasy barbeque while having a fistful of spare coins the aforementioned 12 year olds acquired by whining to their parents, shoved into his face was definitely not one of them. The annoying paper like hat and itchy apron decorated in splashes of oil, grease and fat that made up his uniform at the small canteen he worked at at his local arena was also not on the short list.

"What, is this your first day on the job or something?" The grating tone of voice Gray has come to hate reached his ears over the sound of the sizzling meat on the grill. "We've been waiting around for like an hour," The prepubescent boy groaned out while his two friends who flanked him like henchmen sniggered. Biting back the seventeenth smart ass retort of the day that Gray knew would get him fired if he dared utter it to a costumer, he settled for an annoyed "Tch," and flipped two hamburgers onto two buns already adorned with cheese and vegetables he knows will be picked out and tossed carelessly into the nearest garbage can.

Grabbing the Styrofoam plates which carried the two burgers ready to be eaten, Gray turned to face his costumers, wearing a glare he hoped would wipe off the smug smile on the kid's face, but his efforts proved to be fruitless as the counter separating the two acted as a barrier and created a false sense of empowerment, that unfortunately did not favour Gray.

"Five dollars," Was all Gray said as he punched in the order on the register. He knew at a moment like this his she-demon manager would smile at him and tell him to be nicer to the costumers, with an under lying tone of 'and if you aren't, I'll make sure you sadly go missing and are never found again'.

"Maybe I just shouldn't pay you because of all the attitude you're giving me," The brat in the hockey jersey said, making his friends go "ooh" like the kid had just said the best insult they had ever heard in their short and sad lives.

Being over a hundred percent done with people only an hour into his shift, Gray replied, "Look kid, if you want your food then pay up, if you don't want to pay then you're not getting your food and you're going to have to leave because you're holding things up here," while nodding to the line that was starting to form behind the current costumer. In response, the kid made a face and shoved the clamy coins into Gray's face, barely giving him enough time to grab them before they fell to the floor. Grabbing the plates, the little turd walked off laughing loudly and complaining boisterously the apparent bad service.

_Good riddance,_ Gray thought looking up to the next costumer only to find his second least favourite type of person; the teenage, figure skating girl. Hair slicked back in a tight bun not a stray hair to be seen, who always thought that the cheap canteen he earned his dues at served a lactose free, gluten free, non-fat, half carbs and low sodium meals similar to that of a posh eatery in a trendy town which probably costs half of his paycheck to eat at. These girls were the definition of annoyance, even the human equivalent of a mosquito you hear buzzing around your room once you turn your lights out to go to bed. And the worst thing was that this species of female didn't solely exist at his workplace, but also in the halls of his high school smiling dazzling smiles of whitened teeth and flipping straightened hair over their shoulder, creating a wind of sickly sweet perfume scent that he would never understand why it appealed to most guys his age. They lived off of two hundred dollar allowances a week and whining until they got their way. And for the figure skating sub category, that which the ones standing in front of him fell into, they fed off of the support their parents gave them and investing thousands of dollars because they were sure 'their little angel is going to the Olympics', and earning all this only by smiling like a saint all the while smirking arrogantly behind their backs. Sighing and muttering out the generic welcome in a monotone voice, Gray prepared himself for a long day.

It was a quarter to eleven in the evening when Gray finally had the chance to turn off his register and officially close down the small canteen that had held him prisoner since eleven that morning. Turning off the grill and starting to pack up the condiments and food into their respective containers, Gray felt the restlessness of the moment he's been waiting for all day rise in his chest. After shoving the sealed up containers of food into the bottom of the fridge that kept the drinks cool, and while scrapping down the grill of meat residue, he heard the first sound of the Zamboni make its rounds on the ice, smoothing out the surface, freeing it from nicks and scrapes of the days skating, leaving an irresistible mirror like surface ready to glide on. The anticipation rose once more and for the first time all day, a smile split his face and he scrubbed harder and faster, not wanting to waste a single minute that could be spent doing what he loves most.

Continuing on at top speed, Gray continuously stole glances at the rink, looking as though he was checking to see it was still there. When he had started this job a few months ago, his manager, Mirajane Strauss, had asked why he kept the metal divider between the rest of the arena and his small kitchen area up until the very last minute. Gray had shrugged and responded, "Claustrophobia," but in truth, it was because his skin yearned to feel the crisp air seep into his space and slowly lower the temperate of the room more and more now that he had turned off the grill that acted as a major heat source; it was a lot harder to explain that and he didn't really care to try anyway.

With the food away, cash counted, and now the metal window like contraption slammed shut and lock on the door, Gray scanned the empty arena lobby where the exit to the canteen let out to, checking that no one was lingering. Satisfied with the empty building, Gray made his way to the main office, footsteps creating a slapping sound against the concrete floor and echoing in the silence. Dropping off the cash from the till of the canteen's register in Mira's tiny office, and locking the door behind him, he scanned the arena once more, making sure no one saw him head over to the front desk, reach over and feel around underneath the desk until he found the plastic box he was looking for. Pulling it out and onto the desk, he started to rummage through the contents of the lost and found box, muttering "Please still be here," under his breath. With a triumphant smile on his face, Gray found what he was looking for underneath a child's jacket. Gray took out the pair of men's size 10 hockey skates, thanking his lucky stars for finding them in the first place one night a week ago when he went to pick up his paycheck, and therefore starting the habit of his late night skating sessions.

Without bothering to put back the lost and found box, Gray jogged across the hall to the double doors of the rink and yanked them open, emitting a blast of cold air, only making the smile of his face grow. He walked over to the stands and sat down on the first bench, tugging off his shoes, he jammed his feet into the skates, quickly lacing them up with practiced hands. Soon he was up on his feet, and as he took his first slightly wobbly step onto the rubber mats with bladed feet, he heard one of his favourite sounds; the telltale sound of the blades of skates against the rink. Usually he wouldn't complain, but the sound of scraping ice echoing against the boards that surrounded the frozen water, which were still persisting might he add, were not coming from him as he was still standing outside the boards.

Smile long fallen off his face and instead replaced by an incredulous look, Gray looked up to the rink to see a teenage girl about his age gliding alone on the ice, dressed in a blue and white dress he recognized as one which those figure skating girls wore when they had a practice. The excitement and happiness he had felt just moments before melted into anger and as quickly as he could in skates against a rubber surface, Gray stormed up to the boards, mouth open and ready to shout at the strange girl with blue hair stealing his time to skate and be free and alone, when he stopped, struck with the grace she moved with. The figure skating he observed the other girls do when he didn't have any costumers and a class was taking place on the ice was so much different then what this girl was doing right in front of him. It looked more like a waltz preformed solo on ice, and less like she was trying to calculate he exact motion of each movement in her head.

So he stood there, silent, long enough for the girl to execute some simpler moves and even to see her leap into the air and spin, her arms and legs tightly held to her body, and land back on the ice, not wavering once.

Gray never had to announce his presence to her because her gliding had taken her towards the end of the rink he was standing at, and as she straightened from another of her impressive jumps, she turned to face him, making eye contacting causing her eyes to widen in surprise and to fumble a step, making her lose her balance and slip to the ground, landing on her butt with an "Oomph,".

"The rink is closed you know," Gray called out, a frown settling back onto his face now that he was no longer distracted by the girl's movements. "You're not allowed to be here."

"J-Juvia's sorry, Juvia didn't know," The girl responded, face blushing red as she looked down to her lap where her fingers fidgeted with the hem of her dress. As she remained seated on the ice, legs at an angle Gray was sure couldn't have been comfortable, she was like another person; instead of holding herself with grace and poise, instead she was sitting there like a scolded puppy, awkward and blushing.

Pushing open the door on the boards and stepping on the ice for the first time that day, Gray skated over to her, feeling his spirits already rise, despite being stubborn and wanting to remain angry that he wasn't skating away as he pleased. He was also curious as to who this Juvia was why they were relevant to anything.

He stopped just in front of her, frowning down at her and forcing her to look up at him with wide, apologetic and very blue eyes. "What do you think you're doing out here anyways?"

"Juvia has a figure skating competition and needs to practice," Her voice was small and shaky, but he could tell she was trying to stand up for herself, as her hands were now clenched into fists and her eyebrows were slightly furrowed, and the completely helpless look she had been giving him was replaced with a slightly more intimidating one. And even that was as intimidating as a growling puppy.

"Who the hell is Juvia?" Gray asked exasperated. She just looked at him in confusion and tilted her head, giving him a look like how in the world couldn't he know who Juvia was.

"Juvia is Juvia," She said sounding extremely confused, putting a hand to her chest, indicating herself.

"You're Juvia? Why do you talk in third person?" Gray asked rudely.

"Why aren't you wearing a shirt?" Juvia asked back, eyes straying down to his indeed bare chest for a second, before shooting back up to his face, a blush spread across her cheeks.

"Oh shit!" He exclaimed, groaning. He had this bad habit of casually striping, especially when he was excited or happy or stressed. Looking around, he spotted his t-shirt thrown on the bench next to his regular shoes. Honestly, he was slightly surprised the girl hadn't pointed out his lack of clothing before that point. "T-That's beside the point! You're avoiding the topic, can you just leave already?" He was frustrated now, even more so now that he was slightly embarrassed.

"But Juvia needs to practice!" The blue haired girl whined out, finally getting up quickly from the ice, with a surprising amount of ease, making Gray wonder if she spent a lot of time falling down on the ice.

"Maybe you should've come earlier when the rink was actually open," Gray gritted his teeth.

"There are too many people; Juvia does not have enough room to practice properly."

"Sucks to suck. Maybe you should just get your parents to buy you time on the rink," He shot back at her with a sarcastic tone, almost sneering at her.

"It doesn't work like that," She responded looking awkward, for whatever reason he could not fathom. He made a "Tch," noise, being very annoyed with how this situation turned out. Late nights when everyone was gone was supposed to be a time when he could skate when and for however long he wanted to, not to be spent arguing with this random girl.

"I really don't care if you can or cannot get enough practice time, it's not my problem, but you being here when you're not supposed to is, so leave," She looked really conflicted at this point; she was frustrated, annoyed and mildly frightened of Gray.

"I-Is it because you want to skate?" She asked, nervous again and started fidgeting with her hem once more. "Because you're wearing skates and all and your shoes are on the bench when you could've just yelled from the stands or walked onto the ice." Juvia said this all very fast, so that it was hard to keep up with her. But her presumptions were correct, and this frustrated Gray further.

"It doesn't matter what I'm going to be doing! I work here and it's none of your business." He had raised his voice some and she had flinched away slightly.

"Maybe we could share—" Before she could finish he cut her off.

"No, I'm not going to share the rink just leave!" Now he had really scared her, as her head was bowed and she had taken a full step away from him. It was admirable really that despite her obvious want to not be there and not want this confrontation, she kept her ground, mostly. "Fine. We'll race for the rink time."

"W-What?" Her head shot up, her eyes wide not believing what she had just heard come from Gray's mouth.

"We'll race. The first one to complete two laps around the rink gets to stay and use the rink for as long as they please."

"But the person on the inside lap will have an advantage," She responded, pondering this new idea.

"Then we'll do a switch, when we come up to the start line on our second lap, we'll cross over so the person on the inside will go on the out and the person on the outside will go in," He explained remember the technique he once saw speed skaters use. "The person on the outside will cross behind the person on the inside, and we should do it on a corner so it makes it easier."

"O-Okay, sounds simple enough. For the finish, are we doing the first skate over the line or body?" She asked.

"Let's just do skate," He was getting excited for this race; It would be his first real skating of the night and it brought back memories of times when he would go out to his community outdoor rink and race with his friends.

They made their way over to the decided start line, where Juvia dug a grove in the ice with the pick of her skate. They both settled into a starting position, Juvia on the inside and Gray on the outside. "You ready?" He asked her in a low voice, giving her a side glance to her determined face staring straight ahead.

"Yes." Her voice was steady. Looking back ahead, he prepared himself for the race for a moment before counting down,

"Ready, set," And with a deep breath, "Go!" And they took off. Juvia, with the pick on the front of her blades to help her lift off for a jump, took a head start with a solid first push, but Gray caught up quickly using the strong leg muscles he had acquired over the years of going to the gym and skating, using the muscle memory from years ago when he participated in races multiple times in a week.

They stayed neck and neck, until the first corner, where her advantage of having less ground to cover came in handy, and her turns were more practiced, better executed. It didn't matter though, as they came back out onto the straight stretch as his experience with racing and strong pushes came in handy and enabled him to catch up with her, even pulling ahead a fraction, only to have her catch up and pull back ahead in the at the turn. It carried on like this, past the switch and up until the last stretch of straight rink. They could both see the grove in the rink coming up and they wondered if they wold have to end up sharing the rink because of a tie.

It was then that Gray realised that he was either about to lose or tie with a bitchy figure skating girl, despite this Juvia girl being different from most he's encountered, but the sentiment was the same. So with as much effort he could conjure up, he pushed his legs to go harder, to exert more push into his glides, and it proved worth it as he pulled ahead ever so slightly with little to go before the finish line, and thrust one foot ahead so that his skate crossed the finish line a full second before her smaller skate crossed.

A smile crossed his face; his mood had already brightened with being able to skate especially so fast and with purpose, but to know that he won, and he could easily have the next hour to himself skating more helped greatly. He kept on gliding, not really with any purpose, just until he could catch his breath, which, as he looked over to her, was the exact same thing Juvia was doing, minus the smile and bright mood.

"Hey, you didn't do too bad you know," He called over to her where she was now leaning with her back against the boards. He noticed how she had completely regained her breath, but he was still breathing slightly heavier than normal.

"Thank you. Congratulations on winning, Juvia will go now." Her voice went back to wavering and nervous, and although her head was down and her short hair was somewhat covering her face, he could tell her eyes were watering up. He kind of felt bad.

She started to make her way to over where he presumed she entered in the first place, the door opposite to the one he went through where it was easier to get to the change rooms. She went slowly, looking around the empty rink sadly, kind of reminding him of himself. When she reached the door in the boards, she stopped giving the rink a last look, and eyes finally landing on him, a familiar blush decorating her cheeks, maybe she's embarrassed because she lost, Gray thought.

"If you come late on Thursday, the rink is usually pretty empty, if it helps at all," He called to her, making her smile a little in thanks. She turned back around to open the door and once she had stepped onto the rubber mats and off the nice and the door to the boards closed once again, she turned back to look at him,

"Um, you're missing your pants," She said just loud enough for him to hear, blushing madly before turning around and hurrying off to the female's change room. Looking down, he saw that she was right and he was standing there in his boxers and skates. Groaning, he wondered how he even got his pants off over the big hockey skates.

Taking time to put his pants back on, he spent the next hour or so as he had originally planned, skating his heart out and doing whatever he pleased. But as he was put the borrowed skates back in the lost and found, he wondered to himself why he wasn't as elated as he usually was after his habitual skating sessions.

**For those of you who don't know what a Zamboni is, it's a really big machine that someone drives that goes onto the ice and uses something with water to smooth out the ice.**

**But there it is! First chapter, please review and please be nice! Constructive criticism is welcome though (: **

**And just a fair warning, I'm really crap at updating so warning and future apologies!**

**~Mac**


	2. Lunchtime Rush

**Thank you all for the wonderful reviews, here's the second chapter (:**

Chapter 2: Coincidence

On a list of things he hated, high school would've been third, right after annoying kids and bitchy girls with loaded parents. He seemed to hate a lot of things really, Gray remarked to himself when walking to school the morning after his race with the blue haired girl, Juvia. Although he had to admit, he was quite thankful for the early morning November weather that nipped at his bare arms exposed by the summer uniform he was still wearing despite it being winter and not summer. He liked the cold almost as much as he loved skating. Some people tell him that he's weird for that, because he'd never really remembered the experience of getting goose bumps from the cold, or ever shivering the first two weeks of cold weather when the school was too stubborn to turn the heat on because they wanted to save money, but he didn't really care.

Coming up to the corner that intersected with the street that one of his closest friends lived on, he threw his bag down onto the wooden park bench that stood alone on the side of the street, before he himself practically fell down on it. Gray knew she would be late, she always is. He asked her once why she always took forever in the morning and she replied by telling him that he shouldn't go sticking his nose into a girl's morning beauty habits. He had just shaken his head at her, wondering for the millionth time why girls were so weird.

He crossed his arms over his chest, straightening out his legs and leaning back, letting his head face the sky, eyes closed against the first rays of sun peaking over the small townhouses that lined the streets. He briefly wondered if this is how people felt when he saw them stretched out on the beach in the middle of summer, soaking up the heat from the sun, and warming their backs on the equally hot sand. The relaxation that washed over him was like a blanket of snow covering him, eyes closed but nowhere close to sleep, just content with being alone, listening to the world around him, without having it need to affect him. He was more of a morning person, which had surprised many of his friends when they found out the first time they had their now frequent large group sleepovers, which made it better in that moment surrounded by the air with nothing but his thoughts.

"You know, you look more like weirdo than normal like that." A feminine voice he would recognize anywhere cut through the silence, making a small smirk appear on his face.

Without opening his eyes, he replied, "What, kind of like how you look all the time?" his smirk turned into a smile as he cracked an eye open and peeked at one of his closest friends, hands on her hips and blonde hair framing her now mildly annoyed face.

"Now you look more like a jerk." Gray was laughing lightly to himself now, the good morning already having a positive effect on his mood, but being able to tease his blonde haired friend only added to his bright demeanor. He fully opened both eyes now, and grabbed his bag, slinging it back over his shoulder as her stood up.

"Come on Heartfelia, you're going to make me late for school again." He said while messing up her hair with the hand that was not holding his bag, eliciting a sharp squeal and both of her hands going up to her hair trying to flatten it and brushing through it quickly with her fingers, attempting to rearrange it to its original spot. Grumbling and complaining to him, she ran a few steps to catch up with him, giving him a light shove, using her shoulder similar to a hockey body check he had tried to teach her how to do a few weeks back, only resulting in him being thrown off a single step and laughing loudly.

Lucy Heartfelia had been one of his closer friends, and one of the friends he's had for the longest time, which granted, hadn't been as long as other friendships he's seen at Magnolia high school, where he was a senior about to graduate. He had met her about a year and a half ago when he first moved to the street adjacent to hers when he accidentally knocked her over at the new student orientation that was held at their high school just before the start of every new school year. She was temperamental and just about as weird as he was, but they got along; he understood her and she understood him more than any of his friends. This was really what made him closer to her than most of his friends, sure he had other good friends, but Gray wasn't one to talk about feelings with the guys.

"Why do you even bother bringing your blazer if you don't wear it?" Lucy asked, nodding at the jacket that was slung over his shoulder in a similar fashion that his bag was.

"Maybe it will start raining." Gray replied with a shrug, making Lucy scoff.

"And then you would just take your shirt off, not put more clothes on!" She exclaimed laughing at his odd habit.

"Whatever." He gave her an annoyed look before turning his face away to hide the slight blush that covered the tops of his cheeks. The rest of the short walk to school was spent in the same manner; joking around and teasing the other mercilessly to get a rise out of them, a game that Lucy often lost due to her habit of overreacting.

They arrived at their high school in good time, greeting a few acquaintances as they made their way over to their neighbouring lockers. It was lucky for them that their school granted the students permission to choose their locker instead of being assigned one, which both Lucy and Gray had been thankful for when they started at Magnolia high the previous year, as neither of them knew anyone else besides the other. Although they had only met a month before, Lucy was always nervous about making friends and Gray wasn't very good at it as he scared people away either with his strange stripping habit or his silent and almost grumpy demeanor.

"Looks like we're actually the first ones here today." Lucy said with a smile, turning to face me after putting her bag in her locker. He looked over at her, mouth open about to reply, when he caught a flash of pink from over her shoulder. He frowned, about to warn her of the approaching third party but wasn't fast enough.

"Lucy!" A loud voice yelled just before the owner of the voice practically jumped on the blonde's back, making her eyes go wide and stumbling a few steps forward to catch her balance, Gray himself taking a few steps back to avoid her crashing into him.

"Kya!" Lucy let out a girly shriek, trying to twist around to see her attacker. "Natsu!" She yelled out once she saw who had an arm slung over her, the crook of his elbow resting on her shoulder and the rest of his arm draped over her front. The pink haired teenager that was currently laughing his head off in amusement over Lucy's reaction was the very loud part of their circle of friends, Natsu Dragneel. He and Gray were what one might call frenemies, they were best friends really, but they fought all the time, insulted each other and loved to laugh at the other when one of them messed up. Lucy had once remarked that being mean to each other and punching each other in the face was kind of their way of saying you're my best friend and I'm here for you.

"Morning Luce!" Natsu said cheerfully in his loud voice as he kissed her cheek in greeting, causing Lucy to frown a little less and a small blush to spread across her face. They had been dating since the end of August that year, which everyone had seen coming as they had immediately bonded when they met the first day of school just over a year ago; when Gray and Lucy had chosen their lockers, they didn't realise the consequences, and bright sides, of picking two right in the middle of the stretch of lockers and found out that they were surrounded a very large and rambunctious group of friends who had all known each other since they were all children. Of course being the friendly bunch that they are, Natsu and the rest of the group had somewhat adopted them into their circle, and even though Lucy and Gray welcomed the friends, they mused that they probably wouldn't have had much of a choice to say no.

"Tch, get a room would you Flame Brain?" Gray scoffed in mock annoyance, turning back to his own locker, holding back a smirk as he waited for the reaction he knew would start a fight.

"You want to start something Stripper?" Natsu egged him on, a devilish smile crossing his face as he took his arm from off Lucy and stepped around her to glare and try and intimidate Gray, a daily occurrence really.

Lucy sighed to herself, not mentally ready to attempt to break up another fight between the two friends; she wasn't that much of a morning person. Instead she turned back to her locker to take out the books she needed for her first class, tuning out the bickering and barely dodging the odd flying object that was tossed because Gray and Natsu had learned to not start a full out fist fight with each other unless they wanted to face the wrath of the school's teachers, or even worse, their friend Erza Scarlet.

"Good morning Lucy." A cool and collected voice greeted her. Lucy looked up to see a shock of bright red hair that could only belong to the aforementioned Erza. Erza was a senior along with Gray, Natsu and Lucy being juniors, and was widely known due to her position as student council president as well as her amazing athletic ability, high academic levels and all around being a person you did not want to cross in fear of your life. Of course her friends knew her as the same, but they recognized her more as a cake loving, packs-too-much-on-trips, a little different than the rest person.

"Good morning Erza!" Lucy said happily and a little louder than normal to let the two squabbling boys behind her aware of their red haired friend, eliciting a sharp squeak from one of them and a panicked whisper, "_Erza!?"_.

"Good morning Natsu, Gray," Erza turned and greeted the boys who were now attached to each other's hip, an arm around the others shoulder, smiling like they were best friends. "Not fighting I hope." She squinted her eyes at them while Lucy put a hand up to her mouth, trying to hold in a laugh.

"Of course not, we're best friends!" Gray exclaimed in a higher pitch of voice than he usually talks in.

"Aye sir!" Was all Natsu said, reminding Lucy of his strangely odd blue toned cat Happy who instead of meowing like a normal cat, squeaked out sounds that sounded like he was saying "Aye".

"Good." Erza said smiling slightly and nodding her head at them. And so the morning continued as it normally does, with their large group of friends laughing loudly and making other students want to avoid that stretch of hallway due to the risk of potentially being caught up in a harmless wrestle or just wanting to avoid a headache due to the mere high noise level the group created.

Eventually the first bell rung, warning the students that they have five minutes before they will be late for their first period classes, meaning the group of friends all grabbed their books and said their good byes as they parted, the seniors and the juniors, including Natsu and Lucy, saying good bye until they saw them again at lunch, where the group would come together again and cause just as much chaos in the cafeteria as they caused in what Natsu, Gray and a few other boys had claimed to be 'Fairy Tail's hallway' that morning. How the group came up with the name Fairy Tail to dub themselves was beyond Gray and when he and Lucy had tried to ask, they were just confused to multiple different stories, some more realistic than others, but they never got the same answer from more than one person.

Gray said his goodbyes before turning off to walk to his first class, books in his hand and the other hand stuffed in his pocket, the expression on his face reading 'I don't give two shits about anything', which he really didn't, but much to his surprise, this demeanor had been fairly popular among the female population at this school and he had grown what Lucy would joke as a 'fan base'. Love letters occasionally in his locker, girls blushing when he made eye contact with them and giggling and whispering in their group of friends stealing glances when they thought he wasn't looking. In all honesty, Gray found in annoying, the girls were too much like those figure skating girls he detested.

Rolling his eyes at the batch of girls who were putting a damper on his good morning mood, he caught sight of a head of blue hair at the end of the hall, making him frown as he felt a rush of something he could only describe as nostalgia wash over him. Seeing blue hair in the halls of Magnolia high wasn't something new, he even had a few blue haired friends in Fairy Tail, but he knew none of them had classes down in the section he was in. Shrugging it off, he completely forgot about it as he entered his classroom and sat down at his seat in the back and prepared himself for his morning math class.

The first two periods of school passed uneventfully for Gray, got back a test with another average grade, realised he hadn't finished the homework that was due for today, the usual things really. When the bell for lunch finally rang, Gray swore it was more of a sweet jingle than an obnoxious blare.

Sauntering in to the cafeteria that was a gym when it wasn't the lunch period, Gray immediately looked over to the table in the far back that the janitors have just learned to push together three of the lunch tables that were put out before every lunch and taken away as soon as it finished for students to use the gym for its actual purpose, and saw the beginning of his group of friends had started to gather.

Currently, Levy McGarden, Gajeel Redfox, Cana Alberona, Lucy and Natsu were seated at the conjoined tables, eating their respective lunches, talking away and occasionally laughing at something somebody would say.

Levy McGarden was a junior who was very close with Lucy, probably due to their mutual love for reading, and dating aforementioned Gajeel Redfox; an intimidating guy who was also a junior whose face was donned with multiple piercings covering his face and even something he called dermal piercings which covered his arms. He had once told Gray that he had grown up in a rough neighbourhood and got involved in things he shouldn't have, that his life before he came to Magnolia high and met all of Fairy Tail was less than ideal; it kind of reminded Gray of himself. Although, how Levy and Gajeel had even come to start dating was a mystery to Gray that he didn't even attempt to delve into the depths of their romantic relationships to figure out, as the two appeared to be complete opposites, though they seemed to work well together. Or at least that's what he gathered from what Lucy would tell him when she would start talking about anything and everything, despite knowing Gray was hardly half listening.

As for Cana Alberona, she a fellow senior as well as another girl who had connected with fairly quickly, although not as close as Lucy, their personalities seemed to mesh well and when they shared a class, they always partnered up to do group projects. Cana was a very different sort of girl, she wore a floor length skirt instead of the given shorter school skit, was often drunk and sneaking alcohol into school, bringing it in water bottles and travel mugs, getting away with it because her ever loving father was the vice principal of their high school.

He walked by their table on his way to the lunch line, giving them a quick wave before proceeding on his way to line up. He always bought his lunch, it was cheap and he was way too lazy to be making his lunch every morning. Lucy had told him multipile times to just make it in the evening before going to bed, but he was too lazy for that too. Sometimes, if he was lucky, his manager and also older sister to the two other Strauss siblings that were in Fairy Tail, would make him his own lunch which would more be a two course meal than the usual serving of cold pasta salad he would pick up at the caf.

After picking up and paying for his usual, Gray headed back over to the table, glancing over the heads of other students to get a glimpse of his group which had grown in number and now sat Erza and her boyfriend Jellal Fernandes, Wendy Marvel, a freshman and Natsu's adoptive sister, Romeo Conbolt, also a freshman and son to the freshman and sophomores boys' gym coach, and Lisanna Strauss, another junior.

Not looking where he was going, he bumped into someone shorter than he was, and who obviously was not expecting him to run right into them, as they let out a sound of surprise and as he looked down, he saw the girl stumble a few steps back before gaining her balance, nervous eyes shooting up to meet his, giving him a jolt of recognition when their gazes met.

"Juvia is very sorry! She did not mean to run into you look that." The blue haired girl from the previous night clutched the water bottle she was holding in her hand tightly while bowing to him slightly, eyes looking intensely at the ground, shoulders tense like she was waiting for him to start yelling at her. He may have let out an annoyed "Watch where you're going" on any other day, but he was still in shock over seeing this girl that he had met and raced against for ice time just last night.

"Hey, you're that girl!" He exclaimed instead of snipping at her. She looked back up at him with a confused face similar to a look he had been given before racing her.

"What?" She looked nervous and unwilling to meet his gaze for more than a few seconds at a time, and her voice matched these nerves.

"Last night, you and I raced at the community ice rink to see who could stay and use the rink for themselves." He explained to her, though she still looked confused.

"I-I know." She stuttered out.

"Well, I didn't know you went to the same school as I did." Gray said this as though it was the most obvious thing in the world. She took a second before the confusion left her face, replaced first by a sad lost puppy kind of look, and then to a look of sad understanding and unwilling acceptance of something he didn't understand, and it may have been a trick of the light, but Gray could've sworn he say tears collecting at the corners of her blue eyes, threatening to spill over, before she looked towards the floor once again, and muttered,

"Juvia is in your first period mathematics class,". _Was she really?_ Was all Gray could think as he started to feel more and more like a prize a asshole as the seconds ticked by.

"Oh." Was all he said. With one last quick look into his eyes, she continued on her way, brushing by him while saying "Juvia will go now". All he could do was stare after her feeling like a dick, before accepting defeat and turning back to his table, plopping himself down between Lucy and Erza.

"Who was that blue haired girl you were talking to Gray?" Lucy asked as he sat to right.

"Hm? Oh I don't know, just some girl that I bumped into." Well it wasn't all a lie. Scanning the cafeteria, he found her seated by the table that everyone hated, the table that was closest to the doors that led to the outdoors as it let out a draft something fierce, and even Gray who was impervious to the cold, didn't enjoy sitting there. She wasn't alone, although she looked far from what other people looked like when sitting and chatting with their friends at lunch period, she sat with three other guys; one very large and old looking guy who Gray knew only because he was the only blind kid at their school, another lankier guy with odd green hair and a freaky moustache, and the third guy was one who Gray actually knew; Totomaru, a bad kid with tattoos on his face and parts of his hair bleached white who Gray only knew because he often had run ins with Natsu and Gajeel talked about him being a part of the group he used to run with before he changed his life around.

But all that Gray really noticed was how Juvia looked utterly bored, devastated and like she wanted to be anywhere but at that table at the same time. He watched her as she would take a sip from her water and attempt to be intrigued by whatever Totomaru was boasting about but he could tell she could care about it and caught her staring off into space with a longing look he was sure he wore sometimes when he was stuck in a boring lesson and was day dreaming about being on ice.

Eventually, he was pulled out of his own creepy watching of this Juvia girl and back into a debate that his Fairy Tail friends were having, and was soon involved and she was put out of his mind. But when he was picking up his garbage at the end of lunch, about to head back to his locker and prepare for his third period class, he couldn't help but notice there was conveniently a single empty place at their three combined tables.

**I know, I know, hardly any Juvia in here and I'm still trying to figure out what I went on about for almost 4,000 words.. but he's the second chapter and its only been about ten days since I first published!**

**As for a note on updating: I think I'm going to go for around every ten days-two weeks. And if you ever are wondering about when the next update is coming or just want to keep in touch and know more about process and stuff, you can check it out on my tumblr, the URL is wecameasmarauders and I'm going to set up a page where all Just Maybe fanfic related things can be found. So follow me or just check back in every once and a while to keep updated if you want. And hey, if its taking an extra long time, I might give you a snippet? ;)**

**There will be more Gray and Juvia interactions in the next chapter, and NOTE, Totomaru is part of the Element 4, he's the fire guy. **

**Until next time! Merry Christmas to all of you!**

**~Mac**


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